...is for us.
I was at the closing of the Poverty Truth Commission in Glasgow today. It was one of those days that change you and how you see things, when you see so much good going on and you realised how much good there was still to do. And all the good is done despite what is taken away from people. I came away realising (again) poverty is so nothing like what we imagine. It is never a single issue, and always more complicated and chaotic than you can imagine. And it is never what we can do for people but what we can do with people.
It is so true that there hasn't been a programme yet invented or will be invented that will solve issues like this. It is always the relationships built. The commission was not made up of the 'technical' experts with theory but the experts who lived in poverty with others willing to hear and be changed and create positive relationships. Clearly these experts were way ahead of any programme coordinator.
David Lunan who was a commissioner said:
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"Of course the problem is not poverty, it's wealth. As long as we live in, and even applaud, a culture in which money is the bottom line, the top line and the front line, there will always be people having to live below the poverty line. The Poverty Truth Commission is teaching us a new way to listen, and relate to one another, and make critical decisions; and its legacy will change how we think" |
I just want to know what some of our major politicians weren't asked to sit for the two hours and listen to real poeple tell real stories. Policies would be very different if they did that every so often.
Go to the website. You'll be changed. This has been such an important thing to have done. I hope others will do it. You can.
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